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| Autor/inn/en | Sciurba, Katie; Jenkins, Jerry Rafiki |
|---|---|
| Titel | "Smoky Night" and the Un-Telling of the L.A. Riots |
| Quelle | In: Journal of Children's Literature, 45 (2019) 1, S.4-13 (10 Seiten)
PDF als Volltext |
| Sprache | englisch |
| Dokumenttyp | gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz |
| ISSN | 1521-7779 |
| Schlagwörter | Novels; Awards; Childrens Literature; Picture Books; Police Community Relationship; African Americans; Ethics; Story Telling; Profiles; Law Enforcement; Whites; Racial Relations; Racial Bias; Church Role; Korean Americans; Hispanic Americans; Blacks; California (Los Angeles) |
| Abstract | The year 2019 marks the 25th anniversary of the publication of Eve Bunting's "Smoky Night" (Harcourt, 1994; illustrated by David Diaz). As a Caldecott medal winner, "Smoky Night" is the highest profile picturebook centered on an incident related to police brutality and the profiling of Black citizens--the Los Angeles riots, which followed the beating of Rodney King and the infamous not-guilty verdict of 1992. Although the setting is never explicitly described as L.A. in the text and police officers are conspicuously absent from the entire story, Bunting stated during an interview that the book is "about the Riots in Los Angeles." It is thus noteworthy that police officers are absent from "Smoky Night" because the text ostensibly depicts a "reality" or "truth," as Bunting put it (Reading Rockets, 2014), at the expense of other truths, such as the police's role in the riots. It is also noteworthy that Rodney King and Latasha Harlins are absent from this picturebook, which suggests that including certain people in the story would require telling truths about Blackness in America that would disrupt the story's ideology. In light of these absences, the authors build upon Ching's (2005) important call for the examination of children's literature as an instrument of power and his discussion of "Smoky Night," in particular, to address the following research questions: (1) Which stories are told, and not told, in Eve Bunting's "Smoky Night?" (2) What messages does this award-winning picturebook transmit about the L.A. riots of 1992? The authors conclude that the book is comfortable for those who believe that the story offers a fair and accurate depiction of a historical event and for anyone who prefers to circumvent discussion of: (1) White people's and White police officers' direct role in catalyzing the riots; (2) Black- Korean (and other) racial tensions preceding the riots; and (3) the reality that racial tensions were heightened, not absolved, by the riots, despite the charitable role of the church in providing temporary shelter for all groups. The un-tellings of this book are destructive in that they patronize the entire South Central community--from the angry rioters to the Black, Korean, and Latino families who were not involved in the rebellion and suffered extreme loss-- by reducing their problems to ones that could easily be resolved by two cats and an observant child. (ERIC). |
| Anmerkungen | Children's Literature Assembly. e-mail: info@childrensliteratureassembly.org; Web site: https://www.childrensliteratureassembly.org/journal.html |
| Erfasst von | ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC |
| Update | 2024/1/01 |
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